Today, it is clear for almost every spiritual
seeker that we live in the era of awakening. However, what is the spiritual
awakening is most misinterpreted.

Many people think that awakening and
enlightenment is the same, it’s a single-time event: it’s happening for once
and you are done!. On the contrary, the truth is that enlightenment is a
process that is actually a series of awakenings. Let’s take a look to the three
most important turning points during awakening.

01. Awakening from Identification

Every waking moment of our life fits a
personal history with our own Self in its focus. Our life can only be
interpreted within the framework of that history. The reason for that is that
we identify with the voice of the Ego, the narrator of our own story, so
closely that our personal history becomes the foundation of our entire life.

What does this identification mean? It means
that we identify with a form (e. g. our name) that originally did not belong to
us (we are all born without a name), but through identification this specific
form has become a part of our existence.

A closer look at that personal history will,
reveal that our internal story consists of a fabric of experiences and
thoughts. Thoughts that explain our experiences, thoughts that we believe and
with which we identified, thoughts that will thus provide the foundations of
our self-determination.

Our personal history keeps us under its
spell, in a hypnotic state in which all our attention is devoted to the inner
voice and story it tells. In this way we give up our alertness, the world
passes by us, because we only concentrate on the elements of reality that
appear to confirm our personal history. We therefore lose our grip on the deeper dimensions of life. The deeper dimensions are present in our life, but
we lose contact with them because of our lack of alertness.

The question may arise in us whether we are
really identical with our own personal history, or perhaps we are more than
that? Everybody has some vague suspicion that our personal history does not
reflect reality, we are in fact at a deeper level than that.

When everything is apparently all right in
our personal history, we achieve our goals, we are happy, and the vague
suspicion vanishes entirely in us, and our identification with our personal
history becomes more powerful. There are, however, moments in our life when
nothing appears to succeed, so we are unhappy and we suffer. The suspicion then
reinforces in us, and we tend to believe that we are more than the cluster of
thoughts that constitute our personal history. We realize that we are more than
mere thoughts.

If we become aware and conscious of our own
personal history that we are telling ourselves, we have a chance to wake up
from the hypnotic spell of our personal history. This is the first major
turning point in the process of awakening.

02. Awakening from Ego

When the Consciousness identifies with a
form, the Ego appears. The Ego always means some sort of an identification,
self-determination (I am a man, I am a father, I am an Englishman, I am
Christian etc.) The Ego therefore rests upon our identification with things
that are important for us ego.

The Ego is the central figure of our personal
history, based upon the past and looking into the future. The components of the
Ego are thoughts, emotions, memories (with which the person identifies as “my
story”), fixed unconscious roles and collective identifications (nationality,
religion, etc.). Most people completely identify with these components of the
Ego, and for them no self “outside” of this exists.

The identification of the Ego with things
(object, the person’s own body, way of thinking) creates the link of the
individual to various things. The Ego (and thus the spiritually unconscious
person) experiences his/her existence through the possession of various
objects. The satisfaction provided by the sense of possession is, however,
short, so the individual usually carries on the pursuit for new objects. There
is a powerful motivation behind this activity of the individual, a
psychological demand to obtain more, the unconscious sense of “not yet enough,”
and this feeling surfaces in a want for more. This want is a more powerful
driving force for the Ego than the desire to possess. The uneasy feelings,
recklessness, boredom, stress and dissatisfaction are all largely the products
of the dissatisfied longing for more.

The thoughts such as “it’s mine,” “I want
it,” “I need it,” “it is not enough,” belong to the structure of the Ego. The
content of the Ego changes with time; it is replaced with new contents. No
content is, however, able to lastingly satisfy the Ego as long as the structure
of the Ego remains in its place. The individual keeps looking for something
different, something that promises a greater satisfaction, making the sense of
self of the individual more complete.

The Ego intends to elevate the forms
(including its own form) to eternity, which is impossible. This intention of
the Ego will be the source of all sufferings, because its world of forms and
shapes shall collapse like a sandcastle after a while, until death snatches
away the last of the forms: its body from it. It came empty-handed from
Nothing, and that is how it is going to return there. The only treasure it
could take along with it is its wakefulness, but the Ego considers that
worthless in the world of forms and shapes, as it was not a means of increasing
the power the Ego

The Ego is not bad, it is simply unconscious.
Ego is the deepest dream of the Consciousness. If an individual is able to
notice and observe the functions of the Ego, he or she will be able to
transcend it. In that case, the individual who has been looking for a more
complete perception of the self will recognize that it has always been there,
but the functions of the Ego—identification with objects and thoughts—has
pushed it into the background. One of the ways of transcending the Ego is not
reacting wholeheartedly to the ever-changing kaleidoscope of thoughts and
emotions, but concentrating on the alert consciousness in the background
instead.

In most people, the term “consciousness”
identifies with that socially conditioned Ego. At a number of people this identification
is so powerful that they are unaware that their life is governed by a socially
conditioned mind.

Those who are able to go beyond that
identification with the mind recognize this state of being socially
conditioned, and are also able to leave the social conditioning behind. Such a
person will not identify with the mind but, increasingly, with the
Consciousness. The

Alertness shall, therefore, control the mind
to an increasing extent and will be manifested through the tranquilized mind.

When our identification with a form ceases, a
new space is generated between us and the form and we are able to see and
recognize that we are not identical with that form. With the dissolution of the
identification, the Ego also disappears. This is the second major turning point
in the process of awakening.

03. Awakening in Alertness

The gateway leading us to the deeper
dimensions of Life is Alertness, which appears as a result of the release of
our attention from the hypnotic state of listening to our personal story. The
new Alertness enables us to learn about ourselves without identifying with our
thoughts and emotions.

What we first experience in this new, alert
state beyond our thoughts and emotions is the completeness of existence. In
that state all fragmentation disappears from our life, we recognize the inner
spaciousness of our existence, our inner happiness and tranqulity. We feel at
home in our own skin, and we realize that our alert consciousness is free from
all kinds of thoughts and emotions.

In that state of Consciousness an entirely
new dimension of existence opens up for us, showing us Existence from a
completely new perspective. The unity behind the controversies is revealed in
front of our eyes, and we no longer insist on looking on the sunny side of life,
as we are able to discover beauty on the dark side, too.

We accept life as it is, and it is not done
under pressure, since that acceptance is the result of our complete freedom.
The freedom is, in turn, a fruit of our escape from the world of Shapes and
Forms. We have understood and experienced the process of awakening. The time
has come for us to take control over our mind whenever it is required by the
circumstances. When we do not need the work of the mind directly, let us give
it some rest.

Everything will be quiet and peaceful in us.
We are beyond all good and evil, we are a mere Consciousness that does not
analyze or judge, only contemplates. We realize that the same contemplating
soul lives in everybody, so the differences between human beings are only
superficial, and deep inside we are all the same. Experiencing that unity will
bring us the ecstasy of Life, the perfect joy of Existence.